This Gorgeous Game
by S.S.Ezria
Summary: What if Aria and Ezra had not met at the bar? Would they have still found their way to each other?


**Happy PLL day!**

**NK should be updated within the next 2-ish weeks (I think).**

**I'm experimenting with this fanfic and hopefully you will like it! I don't know where I'll be going with this, or if I'll even continue it at all. **

**Disclaimer; I don't own PLL, the characters, or even the title of this story. I stole it from a book (Also titled **_**This Gorgeous Game**_**, obviously) I also found the quote below in said book.**

"_I simply have no business being [in] love and playing around with a girl however innocently…And though I have kept my vow- I wonder if I can keep it indefinitely and still play this gorgeous game!"_

-Thomas Merton

"Are you excited for your first day, Z?" Jackie Molina asked her boyfriend, Ezra Fitz, as they ate their breakfasts together.

"Yes I am," Ezra answered, grinning, "I'm really looking forward to teachi—"

"I, for one, don't understand how you're gonna do it," Jackie interrupted, making a disgusted face. "I mean, teaching? Really? I can't stand children. They're whiny, needy, think they're entitled to everything, and challenge authority every opportunity they get!" She shuddered at the mere thought of adolescents.

Ezra's heart sank. His hopes to start a family with Jackie were slightly crushed. He chuckled to himself. Only Jackie Molina could make such an impact on someone with only a simple sentence,

"Well," Ezra defended, "my students will not be children, per say. They're 16 and 17; they're young adults."

Jackie contorted her face into an expression of disgust once again. "So pretty much the obnoxious sluts-in-training who won't read anything longer than a one-hundred forty character tweet."

"I'll be teaching honors students." Ezra retorted, rolling his eyes, "They are supposedly the more intelligent kids who enjoy learning."

"I hope you're right, Z, baby." Jackie cooed as she leaned over the table to give Ezra a kiss.

"Well, I gotta go!" He said, reluctantly rising from his seat and grabbing his briefcase.

"Good luck!" Jackie said as Ezra bent down to give her one last kiss before heading out the door.

Aria Montgomery entered Rosewood high school feeling meek and unsure. Her feelings toward Rosewood and the high school were a mixed bag—she didn't quite know if it all felt comfortingly familiar or completely novel. Even though Rosewood was her birthplace as well as the town in which she had spent her adolescence, she still felt like a stranger in a strange land. She had not spoken with her friends since she moved to Iceland, and she was afraid that her friends would reject her. She couldn't decide if she wanted to buddy up to her old friends only to discover that they had ditched her or fallen out of touch, or if she wanted to just wait and see if they would approach _her_.

Luckily, someone approached Aria first as she got out of her dad's car.

"Look who it is! How was Finland?" Aria looked up, her eyes meeting Noel Kahn's. She could not fathom that her middle school crush could get any hotter, but she was wrong. Noel now was taller and more muscular. He was tanner, too, which made his pearly-whites glisten even more.

"Me?" Aria asked, at a loss for words. 'Of course he was talking to me,' Aria thought to herself, 'I'm the only one in sight who just came back from Iceland!'

"Actually, I was in Iceland," She corrected Noel, realizing that her comment didn't redeem her like she initially believed.

"Noel rolled his eyes. "Same thing."

Aria refrained from saying "Not really," Not wanting to stultify herself even more.

Noel clapped her back. "Anyways, glad you're back, Finland!"

Noel had drawn more attention to Aria then she had realized. Emily seemed to notice Aria, and she walked right over to her.

"Aria! You're back!"

Aria and Emily leaned into an awkward hug.

The girls casually compared schedules as they entered the building. They discovered that they were in the same first period AP English class. "Apparently our English teacher is new, and I hear he's really hot!" Emily whispered, trying to make friendly conversation.

Emily and Aria headed up to room 226 and plopped themselves down at two random seats. The teacher was writing his name on the blackboard so Aria could not see his face, but from the back, he looked young and he appeared to be smartly dressed. He turned around and stepped away from the board, which revealed that his name was Mr. Fitz. Aria sized up her teacher. He had thick, chocolate brown hair cascading into waves that were not too long but not too short, and twinkling, oceanic blue eyes that lit up his entire face and seemed to hold many a story. Aria couldn't help but take note of his attractiveness.

Mr. Fitz smiled to reveal a warm, boyish grin, teeth pearly and perfectly straight.

"Welcome to English class. My name is Mr. Fitz." He said.

Aria couldn't pinpoint exactly why, but her heart began to flutter upon hearing his voice and seeing him in full.

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